Published: 26 January 2012
By TOM FOOT

GLENDA Jackson has voiced vehement opposition to legalising assisted suicide in a Parliamentary debate, comparing the act to “murder”.

The Labour MP for Hampstead and Kilburn opposed calls for changes to legislation in this country.

She told the Commons: “There is something drastically wrong with a society that can contemplate legalising something that is, to my mind, murder.”

The former actress, speaking at the “Care of the Dying” debate last Tuesday, revealed to the house the “greatest regret of her life” was not being present at the death of either of her parents.

She added: “One of the greatest privileges that can be afforded to a caring person – to us as human beings – is to be present at that moment when the last great adventure begins, when life slips away.”

Last week, Katherine Lennard told the New Journal about her plans to travel to Switzerland for an assisted suicide with Dignitas.

The 55-year-old, who lives in Belsize Park, wants the process made legal in this country so she can die with dignity at home with her family.

Ms Lennard said how watching her father die, over seven weeks in hospital from lung cancer, was an experience she did not want for herself.

One of the arguments against assisted suicide is that it would take away from the palliative care team and hospices, like the Marie Curie Hospice in Hampstead that Ms Jackson said offer “the most extraordinary care”.

She added: “I remember, because I am quite old, frightening diseases when I was a child were cancer, and consumption – tuberculosis – which was deemed an absolutely incurable illness leading inevitably to death.

We hear that its incidence has increased, but we do not hear much about it being an absolute death sentence.

We should all support the advances being made in medical science and research, not only in curing illnesses but in preventing their onset.

In this instance, it is paramount that our society turn its face away from what could become legalised murder, and argue and press the case for increased funding, increased support for palliative care and, most markedly, support for hospices.”

Tory health minister Anne Milton said: “Everybody deserves a good life and that is why we came to this place.

This debate has allowed us to debate, discuss and share the opportunities that exist for Parliament to allow people a good death too, with dignity, without pain, in the company of those we love and at peace in death with the lives that we have led.”